“No, not really. It’s quite small. Mostly we use the Knights Hall on Rutherford Ave.”
“How old were the kids?”
“Grammar school, ages six to twelve.”
“You got a list?”
“A list? Of what? The students?”
“Students and tutors.”
“Yes. I’m sure we do. I have an enrollment book in the church office.”
“Go get it.”
“Now?”
“Right now.”
“Of course,” the priest said. He went across the small basement and up the stairs toward the church above.
Conn stood silently looking at the crime scene. The room was low ceilinged. The stone walls had been painted yellow. There were folding chairs stacked against the far wall, and several tables with the legs folded leaning against the near wall. Small windows near the ceiling let in a little light, but most of it came from the two fixtures with green metal shades that hung from the ceiling on short cords.
The young cop came back into the room.
“Girl fits her description reported missing last night, about eleven o’clock,” the young cop said. “Parents last saw her yesterday morning when she left for school.”
“Name?”
“Maureen Burns,” the young cop said.
Conn continued to look silently at the crime scene. One of the patrol cops came back. Nobody could find the girl’s underpants.
“Must have taken them,” Conn said. “Souvenir.”
The priest came down the stairs with a brown-covered spiral-bound notebook in his hand. He gave it to Conn. Conn opened it and glanced down the names. One of them was Maureen Burns.
“Do you think it’s one of the students?” the priest said. He seemed less vague than he had been. Conn smelled the whiskey on his breath.
“Yeah.”
“Is that why you want to see the list?”
“The cellar of the local church is not the first place you think of if you’re planning to molest a ten-year-old girl, you know?”
“God have mercy,” the priest said softly.
Conn smiled faintly.
“Hasn’t shown much so far, has he, Father?”
“No.”
Conn had expected a cliché about the Lord’s mysterious ways. The priest was better than he’d expected.
“Go talk to the parents,” Conn said to the young cop.
“I gotta tell them?” the young cop said.
“Take the priest,” Conn said.
Gus
Gus always liked how high the ceilings were in church. Though the Mass bored him, he liked the feeling of elevated space in the room, and the vague participatory sense of tunneling back through time. The feeling was strongest at Christmas, when Gus could feel an almost tangible connection between himself and the manger in Bethlehem.
His mother kneeling beside him seemed the exact opposite. Hunched ecstatically over her rosary, she appeared to shrink in upon her spirit, hugging the sacred mysteries into her imploded self. Tight, narrow, impacted, her faith intensified by reduction, she fumbled her beads throughout the Mass like an amulet, even as she listened to the sermon, nodding her head in rapt assent.
Gus liked the jeweled colors of the stained glass too, although the bright windows always seemed to him like a painting of a painting, the figures in them rendered from statues. On the other hand, where you going to get a real saint to pose?
He noticed when he was quite young that no one in the church art appeared happy, not the statues, nor the stained glass, nor the carvings, nor the bas-relief stations of the cross. As a small boy he simply noticed this, as he got older he wondered about it. Shouldn’t they be happy? What about eternal bliss? He wanted to ask his mother about it, but he didn’t. He knew intuitively that the answers would not make sense to him, and that the question itself would be condemned.
Gus’s father never came to Mass. Not even Gus’s first communion. Gus avoided the subject with his father because Conn always seemed scornful of it, and it made Gus feel disloyal to his mother. He looked at her now, kneeling beside him, her eyes shut, her hands fondling the rosary, her lips moving. At least she’s got something to do, Gus thought. The Latin Mass was largely meaningless to him. He hadn’t been to parochial school. On the other hand he’d gone regularly to catechism on Saturday mornings, while the Protestants slept, without learning to understand the Mass. And most of his friends who had been to parochial school didn’t know what was going on in church either.
Sometimes he stared at Deirdre Mulvoy’s frolicsome bottom, kneeling in front of him. Usually she wore her school uniform, but on Sundays she dressed up for church, and the dress, which Gus thought was silk, hugged her backside. Looking at her made Gus feel hot. He feared he would go to hell. He looked away, at the windows, at the stations of the cross, at the languishing Jesus crucified above the altar. But still he felt the hotness, and inevitably he would look back at Deirdre’s bottom, as she knelt in prayer.
His mother received communion every Sunday, and insisted that Gus receive with her. Which meant that every Saturday he had to go to confession. Usually Gus had only the same venial sins to confess, that he had confessed to last week. He would enter the darkened booth to speak to the priest sitting invisibly beyond the partition, the curtained window between them. Gus would kneel, and say the words.
“Bless me, Father, for I have sinned. My last confession was a week ago, and these are my sins. I have impure thoughts, sometimes. I swear. I disobey my parents, sometimes.”
“Say three Our Fathers, and three Hail Marys, and make a good Act of Contrition,” the priest would say from the dark.
And Gus would begin, “Oh, my God, I am heartily sorry for having offended thee …”
And the priest would say it along with him in Latin. When he finished he would leave the confessional, walk to the front of the church, kneel at the altar rail, and say three Our Fathers and three Hail Marys as carefully as he could, trying not to run the words together, smelling the permanent church smell of incense and empty space.
He always left the church feeling safe in the knowledge that if a truck were to run him down now, he would avoid the flames of hell.
Conn
Maureen Burns’s father was a longshoreman. Her mother was a waitress. They identified the remains of their daughter, age ten years and seven months. The priest was unable to comfort them. Maureen’s father said to the priest, “You pray, Father, all you fucking want to. But if I can find the son of a bitch I am going to kill him.”
The priest glanced at Conn.
Conn said, “I got no problem with that.”
The priest nodded slowly.
“God forgive me,” the priest said. “I don’t either.”
Conn nodded a slight acknowledging nod at the priest, and turned and walked away, out of the morgue, along the drab corridor, out of City Hospital, into a bright April day. On Harrison Avenue, he sat in his parked car, with the window down, reading the coroner’s preliminary report. The full autopsy would come now that the parents had ID’d the body.
The blood was the same blood type as the victim’s. Evidence of penetration but, so far, no trace of semen. Cause of death was apparently the gunshot wound in her head. The progress of rigor indicated that she had probably been dead at least eight hours when she was discovered. If this was in fact the case, it meant she had been killed elsewhere and brought to the church basement. Conn put the report aside.
He took a folded sheet from his inside pocket and opened it. It was the names of the tutors that the priest had given him. It could have been someone else. It could have been a random killing. But it was hard to imagine the killer riding around with the corpse in the car until he found an open door in a strange church. It was pretty surely someone who knew the church. Could be the priest. But, the tutors were a good bet. There were fifteen college students on the list. Thirteen of them were girls. That figured—most boys didn’t teach grammar-school kids. Except maybe
child molesters. He didn’t completely eliminate the girls. He’d heard of cases where the molester was a woman, but not often. Conn didn’t take the idea very seriously. He licked the tip of his pencil and drew a line under the names of the two males: Alden E. Hunt, and Thomas J. Winslow, Jr.
Conn stopped breathing. The shock of the name jagged through him as if some interior fabric were ripping. Thomas J. Winslow, Jr., Harvard University, Cambridge, Mass. Conn took some air in slowly through his mouth, and let it out, and took in some more. Thomas J. Winslow, Jr. He knew it might not be Hadley’s son. He knew there were many Thomas J. Winslows in the world who might send their children to Harvard. He’d seen the name in the papers now and then, though he never knew if it was the same Winslow or another Winslow, and he never wanted to. But he didn’t know it wasn’t Hadley’s son. And if it were? This time it was thrust upon him. This time there was no way not to know. He felt his throat tighten. He felt his solar plexus clench. For a moment he felt disoriented, as if this Boston spring day were taking place in some alternative state of being, and he was a confused observer. The street blurred and he realized his eyes were tearing. He took in more air, and wiped his eyes, and wrote the number 1 beside Alden Hunt’s name. No need to rush. Maybe Hunt was the guy. Beside Thomas J. Winslow, Jr., he wrote the number 2.
Conn
It was a Thursday morning. Knocko was back from court, and he and Conn were drinking coffee in a diner on Kneeland Street.
“I’m in court for a week,” Knocko said. “The jury convicts him. The judge suspends the sentence. And the asshole strolls without any time to do.”
He took a bite of his doughnut.
“Shoulda shot the bastard when we grabbed him,” Knocko said.
Conn nodded.
“Let’s think about that,” Knocko said. “We find the perp in that Charlestown killing.”
Conn stared down at his coffee. It was in a thick white mug that was showing signs of age.
“I’m on that alone, Knocko,” Conn said.
Knocko ate the rest of his doughnut. He drank some coffee and wiped his mouth with a paper napkin.
“Something I should know, Conn?”
Conn shook his head. Knocko drank the rest of his coffee, put the mug down, and stood. Conn stood with him. Knocko said, “Thanks, Vinnie,” to the counterman and they left without paying.
From his desk, Conn made some phone calls. He learned that Alden Hunt was a member of the Tufts Glee Club and had been singing close harmony in Brunswick, Maine, during the time that Maureen Burns must have been killed. With his pencil stub, Conn drew a line through Hunt’s name.
Conn talked with Thomas J. Winslow, Jr., in his room on the second floor of a Harvard dormitory on Memorial Drive.
“Conn Sheridan,” he said when the boy opened the door. He showed his badge. “Boston Police Department.” He smiled. “Nothing to be nervous about, just a routine investigation.”
The boy asked him in. He was an ordinary-looking boy. Pale blue eyes, round head, pale blond hair, pink face. Medium weight, medium height. Sturdy build.
Conn sat down on the edge of the bed. He took out a small notepad and opened it. He took out his stubby pencil. He didn’t need the notebook. He never forgot anything. He rarely wrote anything down. But it disarmed the people he talked to, and he always took it out. He looked down at it as if to refresh his memory.
“Thomas J. Winslow, Jr., right?”
“Yes, sir.”
Conn wrote it down just as if it were one name in many and he’d forget it if he didn’t.
“Parents’ names?”
Conn felt the phenomenon he had always felt when the stakes were mortal. He seemed to relax in upon himself. Like a hibernating animal whose metabolism slows to get it through the winter. His breath came easily and deeply. His shoulders and arms seemed supple, his spine relaxed. It was as if he were suddenly sensitized to the pull of gravity. The cop part of him seemed to be operating independently.
“My father is Thomas J. Winslow, Sr.,” the boy said. “My mother’s name is Hadley Winslow.”
Through the front window Conn could see the river moving pleasantly eastward, flowing toward Boston Harbor where it would mingle with the Atlantic Ocean, into which, three thousand miles away, the River Liffey emptied.
“How old are you, Tom?”
“Eighteen.”
Four years older than Gus. Conn scribbled the age in his notebook, as if it were important.
“Both your parents alive?”
“Oh, yes.”
“Where do they live?”
The boy gave Conn an address on Beacon Hill.
“How come you don’t live at home?”
“I wanted the campus experience. My parents thought I should have it.”
Conn nodded.
“Brothers and sisters?”
“No, sir.”
“Only child.”
“Yes, sir.”
Conn smiled at him.
“Me too,” Conn said.
The boy seemed encouraged.
“What is this about, sir?”
Conn continued to smile.
“There was a murder, couple days ago. Found a girl dead in Charlestown, church basement.”
The pinkness in the boy’s face seemed to become blotchy. He started to speak and stopped and cleared his throat and tried again.
“Why are you asking me questions, sir?”
“Just routine background information,” he said kindly.
The boy nodded jerkily. He seemed nearly paralyzed. The cop part of Conn thought, Un-huh!
“Routine stuff,” Conn said nicely. “Things I need to know.”
Conn leaned forward slightly and his voice became suddenly hard.
“Like did you shoot her before or after you bit her on the ass?”
The boy’s face was very pale. His mouth opened wider and Conn could hear him gasping as if he weren’t getting enough air. Then the boy stood up, took a step toward the door, and fainted.
Un-huh!
Conn
Conn put his notebook away in his inside pocket, and squatted beside the boy. He felt the boy’s pulse. The pulse was strong. He checked to see if he’d swallowed his tongue. He hadn’t. Conn stood and looked thoughtfully around the room. His calm was so deep, it was almost lassitude. Methodically he began to search the room.
As Conn searched, the boy on the floor stirred and opened his eyes. Conn continued. The boy looked blankly at him. Conn was neat in his search. He picked things up and put them back, carefully. The boy edged himself toward the wall, and wormed into a sitting position with his back against the wall. He stared around the room for a moment, then focused on Conn.
Conn’s search technique was not linear. He had found over the years that most people hid things where you’d expect them to, so that it was more efficient to search a room in order of decreasing likelihood.
“What are you doing?” the boy said.
Conn didn’t answer him or look at him.
“What are you looking for?”
Conn lifted the mattress off the iron bed frame. There was a pair of small white cotton underpants on the spring. Conn picked them up and let the mattress drop. He folded them carefully and slipped them into his coat pocket, and turned and looked at the boy.
“How did you get into Harvard?” Conn said.
The boy stared at him. The pallor was gone. He looked feverish. Conn smiled.
“I been a cop now twenty-four years,” Conn said. “And you are the stupidest fucking pervert I’ve ever met.”
“What do you mean? I don’t know what you mean.”
Conn shook his head sadly.
“You kill someone, and you stash her in a place where you’d be an automatic prime suspect. And then you keep the one piece of evidence that will sizzle your ass. Did you want to get caught?”
The boy climbed to his feet, his back still against the wall His movements were slow. Conn knew how he felt. He remembered the clau
strophobic weakness in his legs when they took him to Kilmainham Jail.
“I don’t know what you mean.”
Conn sat on the boy’s desk, one foot on the floor, one foot on the desk chair. His coat was open and the butt of his service revolver showed. Conn nodded toward the bed.
“Sit down,” he said. The boy hesitated against the wall. Conn saw his eyes move toward the door. It was too far. He’d have to go right past Conn. Conn knew he had no strength for it. He nodded toward the bed.
“Sit,” Conn said.
The boy sat on the edge of the bed.
“You need a glass of water or anything?”
The boy shook his head.
“Tell me about it,” Conn said softly. Looking at Hadley’s son, the stillness seemed to fill him up, to spread through every capillary. He felt quiet, and very steady.
“What?” the boy said. His eyes were red, and he couldn’t hold Conn’s gaze.
“About Maureen Burns,” Conn said softly. “About how you pulled down her pants and bit her on the ass and fucked her.”
The boy began to cry. Conn continued to speak softly. His voice sounded kind.
“And killed her,” Conn went on. “And where you did it. And why you dumped her in the church.”
The boy’s crying intensified.
“And what the teddy bear was for.”
Conn smiled encouragingly.
“Stuff like that,” he said.
The boy made no attempt to stifle the tears. He sat on the bed with his arms clutched in on himself, crying hard.
“You probably feel like you couldn’t help it,” Conn said. “Like you couldn’t stop and when it got under way and she was weak and struggling you probably didn’t want to stop because the feeling was there. Like a big surge, and then you bit her and that hurt and you fucked her and that hurt, and she was probably crying and then you were through and you didn’t want to hear her crying. That’s about how it went, isn’t it? Everybody always assumes that guys like you kill the victim to cover it up. But that’s not why, is it?”
The boy was sobbing, shoulders hunched, head down. Conn seemed not to hear him.
All Our Yesterdays Page 10